Thank you to everyone who attended my live event at Content in Northfield. I was humbled and grateful to see you there, and I am even more humbled by the number of views the Facebook Live has had!
After a book event, many ask me, “Did you have fun?” My usual answer is, “Fun is not really what I would call it. I feel like I am walking around without any clothes on.” Grief does that to us, it makes us feel raw and vulnerable. Early in my grief journey, I hated how vulnerable grief made me feel. “My head was on my knees, and my arms were wrapped around me in self-defense and pain. Would grief always be embarrassingly raw this way?” (WGBH, p. 143).
Grief robs us of the life we had planned: growing old with our loved one. For me it was being in the garden with grandchildren and Klaus; growing beans, corn, and flowers for picking and raising chickens again for the opportunity it provided for children to chase them out of the garden and gather their eggs.
Fear and worry are left in grief’s wake. “Life had hurled its ammunition at me, and I was exhausted with worry and fear” (WGBH, p. 143). But thankfully, friends, we aren’t on this journey alone and we can recraft our experience with the help of those who walk with us on our journey. Being vulnerable allows for the opportunity to connect in new and different ways; ways we did not anticipate.
In gratitude for all of my sojourners.
Blessings,
Susan